Saturday, May 30, 2009

I got there over an hour early, so I was 6th in line to get in. As I got through the door, the NRA was there in force passing out fist fulls of cash to everyone in order to "keep the gun lobby in line." Cool, cool.

Then I had to wade through the herds of uniformed Nazis, Somali warlords, Iranian generals, and the Illuminati just to get to the table where they sell reloading stuff, but it payed off because I found primers!

Now, the first thing I grabbed from that table was a five pound jug of Alliant Reloader 15. I did catch a fleeting glimpse of the ever elusive Hodgdon Varget, but my attention was quickly drawn to the cases that the friendly man was moving around behind the table. I asked him if any of them happened to be non-magnum large rifle primers, and he kindly asked how many I desired. These days a one-cartridge-box-a-year shooter would have bought every single one he had, but that would make them a douchebag. Since there was already a line of about twenty wide eyed people waiting to buy primers, I bought a thousand, which will last me the rest of the year if I'm stingy, and left several cases for the next guy to buy up.

I did not find a single solitary round of .32 ACP, but I did find several boxes of .380 ACP for $48 for 50, or $30 for 20. One table was actually sawing off arms and legs for a box of them. No shit!

The rest of the stuff I got was small potatoes. I do note enthusiastically that gun prices seem to be stabilizing some. There were the gun dealers who had some of their guns marked up a hundred dollars or more from the table ten feet away that had the same gun at a fair price. 1911s are still pretty scarce, but ARs and AKs were abundant. .223 Remington ammo was hovering around $400 for a case of 1,000, which is certainly better than the dollar a round that it was two months ago, but several of the vendors who had 9mm ball thought they were selling crack. I insist that they were smoking it for selling a box of 50 handloads for over $20 when a table around the corner was selling American Eagle for $15.

Thursday, May 28, 2009

How about all of that body armor. Why, I bet those Mexican drug cartels are buying them and placing 'Policia' on it just to confuse US politicians. It's all in good fun.

And just where in the world have we seen well worn H&K G3s? Absolutely not in the hands of any Mexican military or law enforcement. Uuuugh ugh. No sir.

And those beat to shit AK-47s? There's no way those came from Central America. Nope. I heard that you can pick one of those ugly things at US gunshows. No, really!

Those nasty gun dealers artificially age them by putting them into washing machines filled with poker chips, and then let them rust all to hell in order to make it look like Columbia is the one selling them at next to nothing. Honest!

In Michigan and elsewhere, once-sacrosanct veterans' programs are no longer safe from the knife as tax revenues continue sliding in the recession.

****

South Carolina plans to cut aid to the VFW, American Legion and Disabled American Veterans in the next budget. Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn recently outlined a "doomsday" budget that would close all four of the state's veterans' home if an income tax increase is not passed, leaving more than 1,000 veterans without care.

Our military veterans are sent overseas to fight, and when they return from giving their pounds of flesh our country turns their back on them. Awesome. That's gotta be great for morale!

"Oh, but CTone, there's a recession! Everyone must give!"

Bullshit!!

I understand that there's a recession and all, and with the exception of our federal government, everyone is tightening their belts, but these veterans entered in a legal contract with the country to be taken care of when they come home. They have already given tenfold.

My criticism is directed toward the Obama administration who decided that the best thing to do during the recession is spend a decades worth of taxpayer's money on a bunch of shit that we don't need, and then groan about how it's so terrible that we have to cut funding for the people that they have a responsibility to pay for.

Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Well before I had guns, there were knives; and they are my first love.

If I had the money to buy a new knife every day it wouldn't be enough. Like any utilitarian, I see the use in every tool that I encounter, and knives are no exception. I want them all.

I always carry a knife of some sort wherever I go, as they are the tool that separates us from the animals. To the squeamish people who are intimidated by the sight of a fine knife: I feel sorry for you.

There is a glorious feeling that one gets when using your over sized $250 tactical folder to part the delicate folds of that letter that your great aunt Bee mailed you. An Every Day Carry (EDC) knife is for everyday chores, or it could perhaps be to save yourself or another from a predicament where no other tool would substitute. I don't hold much confidence in the use of a folding knife for self defense; and it's not that I think that it's not possible, just that it's unlikely.

Besides, that's what handguns are for.

If you're the type of person who loves knives, then I invite you to check out Sharp, Bright, and Tactical WebMagazine. Outstanding is the word that first comes to mind as I read that site, and it has now made my list of daily reads.

Too bad I'm now focused on pouring money into reloading stuff, or I would start collecting knives again. Many of mine have been sharpened into stumps over the years, or taken away (for the safety of the world) by TSA while on my way to Iraq.

If you're on the hunt for a new folder, then check out fellow reader Knives Infinity's website. I have to refrain from smoking my debit card for a little longer, but when I'm going there to start.

"All patrol cars must be equipped with military-style rifles and sufficient ammunition to sustain a firefight. The length of many institutional hallways is beyond the marksmanship capabilities of most police officers armed with handguns. A competent and aggressive rifle program must be part of every patrol officer's skill."

That might make some people suck air, but if you were a cop responding to a shooter in a building, would you rather enter with a rifle or a handgun? I would pick the rifle every time, and agree that a good rifle program is paramount.

As for the other elements of the equasion:

"Teachers, administrators, students, and others are most likely to confront the shooter. Some adults must be armed, trained, and courageously willing to defend themselves and other innocents."

Again, I agree. To some, if a person is not wearing some sort of uniform with a shiny thing on their chest then they are totally incapable of handling a weapon. How ridiculous.

I have heard the arguement that teachers are too busy concentrating on students to be able to handle a weapon, and that multi-tasking in that way will cause them to, like, randomly fire rounds in every direction in the event of a shooting or something. They simply can't do day-to-day things with a firearm on their person. It's too complicated.

I don't think that they realise that cops don't wander around with their hand on their weapon all day, and that most of what they do does not involve using it. If they can write tickets, break up fights, chase down bad guys, and chew gum while walking with a holstered handgun, then so can any other human being. Sending school faculty through a voluntary firearms training course and having them qualify annually, if not more, would put them on a level where they would be of use in the event a spree shooting.

If none of them volunteer, then so what? I'm sure many teachers in many states wouldn't want to participate, and I'm not saying that they would have to. But they shouldn't be denied the opportunity.

The last taste of the article, which should be read in full, is this:

"For many reasons, we will experience more of these incidents in businesses, restaurants, shopping malls, and religious centers, as well as in institutions of learning. In particular, shooters seek "gun free zones," because they know they will more likely not be opposed."

Yeah, I don't think it will take long either. When the lives of babies are on the line, you can never act too swiftly.

I also note the cleverness of the article; implying that the suns rays need to be reflected to save the world from doom, and then oh so casually transitioning to man made carbon being the problem.

When someone discovers white tar and makes shingles out of them then I will look into changing the color of my roof.

I don't normally get into the weeds on environmental issues, but to the eco-geeks out there: make up your freaking mind already. It can't be every last thing in our house, on our house, in our driveway, on the planet, or in the solar system that is causing global warming. . . .or is it climate change? I can't remember if the planet is heating up or cooling down this week.

CORAL SPRINGS, Fla. (WSVN) -- A South Florida officer is recovering in the hospital after a suspected armed-robber shot him four times with an automatic weapon.

"A cop comes up to us and says, 'Get right inside your house right now, there's a robber running around with an AK-47,"

said a resident.An automatic AK47, huh. Sure, sure. And don't count on the media following up with what kind of weapon these guys really used.

In the off chance he did use a select fire AK47, I would blame Mexico, but I'm betting on the weapon being a SKS or a Ruger 10/22.

And how about that brother of one of the scumbags:

"if he didn't shoot at the cop, the cop was going to shoot him anyway."

It's not his fault!! He's really a great guy, I mean he was just trying to get some cigarette money from that auto parts store he robbed with a rifle. The Man has been keeping him down for YEARs, man! Why the po-po gotta be all up in hiz sheeeiiiit?!?!

Phillip Jackson: "This is a national catastrophe that is happening while we as a country do nothing. We're asking for national attention. This is a pandemic. We will not be able to solve this problem in Chicago unless they can solve this same problem in Houston [Texas] and other cities."

I don't see how the blame lies within any city except Chicago. That's pretty thin. It's also pretty obvious that tactics like gun control and peace rallies aren't going to do the job.

"Black youths, he said, are two times more likely than white youths to fail or drop out of school, and at the same time they are also eight to 10 times more likely to be victims of homicide than whites."

That may not be PC to talk about in this day and age, but it's about time it comes to national attention and gets some air time. This is not a coincidence.

Off the cuff, I would say that there is a cultural problem at hand, but how long will it be before it gets brought up on the national stage?

Monday, May 25, 2009

I went out today to do some load development with the 308, and it turned out to be a catastrophe.

A little background about me is that there is a phenomenon with rain when I go shoot; it's to the point where my family expects it and wonders why I bother.

Today was no exception.

The only difference was that it started raining this time right after the very first shot, at which point we moved everything inside and shot off the dining room table (yea, I know we're white trash). I have now resorted to calling mother nature a whore as I wave two middle fingers into the air.

At the absolute soonest time I can sell my house, I am going to do so and move to Utah or Arizona so that I can enjoy my hobby in peace. To hell with Virginia. I don't care if I die of thurst because there is no rain; at least I will be able to shoot for one damn day without getting rained out.

I am not at all kidding when I say that this happens every single time.

None of this matters one bit as I had another catastrophe when my equipment failed. I'm going to have to look back through the paperwork from the Krieger barrel that I ordered from Fultan Armory for an information sheet. It seems that if you load your rounds at 2.800 inches (which is what the damned factory length for this cartridge, and the recommended starting length suggested by every bullet and powder manufacturer and anyone else who has ever loaded .308 Winchester) then the rounds jam into the lands causing the bolt to not close all the way and the round to get stuck in the breach. The bolt was stuck pretty bad, and when I got the bolt to come to the rear, the brass casing came with it but the bullet was still stuck in the barrel. Now I have 44 grains of Reloader 15 coating the inside of my gun.

Hey Krieger, a little freaking warning would have been nice!

Anyways, that little event right there will set me back another month or so, so I'm not real happy about that.

That's all I have to report.

Update: No paperwork with the Krieger/Fultan Armory Titan saying not to load your rounds to the standard length that the entire world loads to. Thanks for that.

At least I now know to load them like an entire freaking inch shorter so that I don't have to pound a bullet out of the lands with my cleaning rod. I can appreciate having a short leade for accuracy sake, but at least give a guy some warning so that cartridges that fit easily in the magazine aren't too long.

Saturday, May 23, 2009

I'm going to start off with a negative by saying that blogger.com sucks. There are way too many bugs and problems with this system; like the fact that I have wrote this post over and over, but it won't save my work. I can't tell you how frustrated I am right now. I started this post on Thursday, and everytime I finish, all of my work disappears. Also, I paid to upgrade my Photobucket account because I was giving them too much traffic, and now everything with my account has changed for the worse. I figured out how to make the pictures clickable, but I have to fiddle around with the code to make it work, after which half of the text in the post is hyperlinked, so I then have to dick around with that. There has got to be a better way.

Enough of my bitching, lets get started.

A while ago I casually picked up some movies for a cheap price from Target to use for a Movie Guns post. I'm always on the hunt for easy films that I can get together without much of a struggle. This one wasn't as easy as I had hoped.

At over two hours, GoodFellas was more of a challenge than I was ready for, but it sure was worth it! This film is full of old school revolver violence, hit men, and plain jane 1911s; not to mention that it also has a first rate cast of actors. There are thirty something pictures, which is a drop in the bucket compared to some of the other movies I've covered, but the length of the film is what killed me.

Ray Liotta plays the main character, Henry Hill, who also narrates the movie from his perspective as he advances up the ranks of the Italian mafia with his friends Jimmy Conway (Robert De Niro) and Tommy DeVito (Joe Pesci).

Going in rough order, we move into the movie where Hill is a grown man making a good deal of money for himself by being ruthless thugs. To give you an idea, Hill and DeVito are seen here taking a truck driver at gunpoint in order to steal his load:

I have no idea what type of double barreled shotgun that is. DeVito has a snub nose revolver concealed in that brown paper bag.

One day, Hill's girlfriend Karen calls him and tells him that the neighbor got a little frisky with her. Hill picks her up, takes her home, and then pulls a Smith & Wesson Model 36 from under the seat of the car:

After sticking it in his waist band, which you can tell that it starts to slip down the front of his pants, he walks across the street and uses the Model 36 to beat the neighbors face in:

I wouldn't recommend using a firearm like that; despite being made of steel, it will most definitely break the gun, or bend it out of shape at the very least. Also, clubbing someone in the head with a one pound piece of steel is a good way to kill them, but I'm sure a mobster could care less. Regardless, after the beating Hill hands the bloody gun to his soon-to-be-wife:

Moving on, we have DeVito, who is a sadistic psychopath, pulling what looks like another S&W Model 36 from his waistband and drunkenly waving it around at his friends while at a club:

This definitely isn't the last time you will see him do this. Later on at a card game, an intoxicated DeVito pulls his Model 36 and waves it at his friends who duck in terror:

Not satisfied with this, he shoots the teenager who is working as the bar keep in the foot:

Unfortunately, the poor lad survives the encounter, only to shoot his mouth off to DeVito after he comes back all bandaged up. DeVito lets his violent complex take over and pulls a M1911 out and shoots him dead:

Classy.

DeVito's character is notoriously violent, and will kill someone with the drop of a hat. Conway was joking around when he told DeVito "you gonna let him get away with that" in regards to the bar keep making a smart ass comment. DeVito, being the killer with a short fuze that he is, didn't get the joke and killed the kid in anger.

His temper will be his demise.

When a "made man," meaning that he is high up in the mafia, makes a disrespectful comment to DeVito later on at another bar, DeVito, with the help of Conway, stomps on the guy before pistol whipping him with a S&W 36 until it breaks:

This is why using your gun as a club is a last resort.

Thinking the man is dead, Hill, Conway, and DeVito put him in the trunk and go get some dinner at DeVito's mother's house. DeVito borrows a big ol' kitchen knife to use to cut the man's body up into smaller pieces, but when they open the trunk, they find out that the man is alive.

DeVito plunges the knife into the man over and over again Caesar style before Conway finishes him off with a S&W 36:

Moving on, Hill wakes up to his disenfranchised wife Karen who has him in a compromising position due to his infidelity:

I'll let you find out for yourself how this plays out.

Next we have DeVito executing a fellow mobster with a suppressed 1911 because the guy accidentally left a stolen truck with finger prints for the cops to find. It wouldn't be long before the cops were at the man's door, so it's best to take care of the loose ends:

Things start to go down hill from here.

DeVito gets whacked for his part in the killing of the above mentioned made man:

Hill is under surveillance by federal agents for selling drugs and guns, like this bag of pistols that he tries to sell to Conway:

One is obviously a Browning High Power, but I can't tell what the other two are that Conway is trying to screw a suppressor on.

As a side note, it's movies like this one that leads the general public into believing that criminals and villains use suppressors.

Anyways, federal agents raid Hill's house to get the drugs, but Karen has already flushed it down the toilet. Here she grabs what looks like a Colt Mustang from the first picture and hides it. . . well, you see:

Do you see? Yeah, in the second picture. . . . there's a gun there. . . .never mind.

Other agents catch Hill in his car as he's trying to get away. Here is an agents Browning High Power with adjustable sights pointed at his head:

I caught this picture from the police station where a female cop has a big ol' honkin revolver in a leather shoulder holster:

I have no idea what it is since I can't see enough of it to get an ID, but it sure is cool!

Last, I got a picture of Hill with a Sig P230 while lying in bed with Karen after he makes bail:

At first I thought it was a Walther PPK, but after another look I have it as a Sig.

This was a tough movie to cover. There's no skipping ahead because I didn't want to miss a picture. There wasn't much of a variety of guns in this one, but the scenes showing gun use were good. I especially liked the realism injected in some of the parts, like DeVito's Model 36 breaking into pieces when he uses it to pistol whip a guy.

This movie is a great one for a collection, and I'm glad I got this one at a good price.

Friday, May 22, 2009

This event had vendors from all over the country showing off anything Force Protection, and some things not. If it's armored, electronic, CBRN detecting, or has a camera, it was at this event.

This show was also a proud sponsor of Big Brother; and I won't depress you with picures of heartbeat sensors, concealed weapon detectors, hand held x-ray machines, and FLIR/night vision equiped coffee cups, but I brought some pics for your viewing pleasure, such as this beast that is a must have for anyone serious about home security:

I finally figured out how to make the pics clickable, so click to enlarge!

Or how about the Mother Of All Shooting Systems (Mo-Ass) remote vehicle machine gun with night vision and FLIR:

For the citizens of the Trinidad neighborhood of DC.

There were tons of remote mounted weapons systems; such as this M240B:

Perhaps the Corner Shot suits your fancy:

It's really easy to control once you get the hang of it, and the video monitor is clear as a bell, even in direct sunlight.

If that's not cool enough for you, then this robot with mounted Atchisson Assault 12 Shotgun with Bushmaster Carbon 15 pistol will surely do the trick:

With the onboard FLIR camera, there's no need to even get out of bed to see what went bump in the night. Sic em' boy!!

For those of you who tend a farm in Appalachia, here's a clever way to locate and destroy those pesky deer herds that keep destroying your crops:

I know some of you are worried about having enough knockdown power with your daddy's 12 guage to back up your buddy on his dream Yeti bowhunt. Well I have the answer for you!

That, my dear readers, is a FRAG-12 shotgun shell. If that doesn't have enough ass to take out a Yeti, than I don't know what does.

If you're more into armor, and want to cruise the streets of Detroit without having to worry about stray 9mm rounds or IEDs, then you might want to check into the latest in rolling protection:

There was plenty more armor around, and even some low profile stuff for celebs, but the coolest idea was this armored thingy for "Gun Free Zone" mall police!!

As for the latest in counter-terrorist fashion, what federal agent acting as the aggressor in a training event would want to be without his inert suicide vest!?!?!

Yes sir!! That's bound to cause a mass panic the next time some SSA forgets to alert the public about that training in the NorthWest corner of the county fair!

To leave on a depressing note, it begs the question of whether these are already being tested on "homegrown terrorists" in the US:

Those are Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) that are designed to look like birds. The idea is to "hide in plain site" from any potential terrorists who are looking up. They're sure to get some use during the next VFW Wounded Warriors cribbage tournament in Dallas!

New York City Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said he believed the defendants knew each other from their time behind bars. Relatives said Payen, David Williams and Onta (AWN'-tay) Williams were introduced to Islam in prison — a trend in prisons around the country in recent years.

"The Onta I know wouldn't do something like this, but the new Onta, yeah," said Richard Williams, an uncle. "He wasn't raised this way. All this happened when he became a Muslim in prison."

****

Cromitie told the informant last July that he wanted to join Jaish-e-Mohammed, a Pakistani terrorist group with which the informant claimed to be involved, the complaint said.

Prisons are breeding grounds for religious extremists? Who would have known.

I notice also that the four men had to "call around to various contacts to get guns," which is weird, because I thought all terrorists went to gun shows where NRA rednecks gleefully hand them the shit with a smile.

The environment and energy package could prove to be one of the most consequential pieces of legislation ever tackled by Congress. It holds the potential to touch every industry and consumer in the nation.

Wednesday, May 20, 2009

I've often wondered what would be a good, all around type of martial art to learn that would suit the needs of an average joe like me on the streets.

Over at Hell in a Handbasket, James suggests boxing, as it is easy to learn the foundation to make for useful combat; even against multiple opponents, which is what my main concern would be. He has a very compelling video on that post that stresses his point. Go check it out.

Violent scumbags generally work in multiples, so a single based approach to empty hand techniques would be training to fail in my case. Also, I'm the exact opposite of flexible, and any attempt for me to do a ninja roll would result in torn things inside my body. While I'm sure you have to be limber, boxing doesn't look like it focuses on the more complex techniques that will require a greater deal of flexibility.

To the frustration and discouragement of many Democrats, House and Senate lawmakers and aides say it now appears likely that President Obama will this weeksign into law a provision allowing visitors to national parks and refuges to carry loaded and concealed weapons.

Well boo hoo. That's what he gets for allowing one of his stupid judges to jam up the law by ruling that citizens can't carry in parks because if they shoot some deadly critter, the lead from the bullet fired might someday endanger a salmon.

Jackass.

The rest of this article is all "dirty Rethuglicans and their evil NRA are stopping sensible Democherubim from saving the planet with sensible gun laws." Just a warning.

What I thought really stood out was what Oklahoma Senator Tom Coburn said:

“I don’t like guns necessarily,” Mr. Coburn said. “What I want is those constitutional rights to be protected.”

Constitutional rights protected. Now there's an idea.

It's about time that someone in our federal government took the time to honor the very thing they swore to uphold. Good on you Senator.

"Of 30 rifle magazines recently taken from insurgents’ corpses, at least 17 contained cartridges, or rounds, identical to ammunition the United States had provided to Afghan government forces, according to an examination of ammunition markings by The New York Times and interviews with American officers and arms dealers."

That's the whole thrust of this piece. The Taliban have been able to fight the US for eight years because a NYT reporter found some WOLF headstamped cartridges in 17 magazines. That's crack reporting. That's why reporters go to college. That's what makes them professionals.

The type of ammunition in question, 7.62x39 millimeter, colloquially known as “7.62 short,” [or "armor piercing/incendiary" "cop killer" "child piercing" death rounds, for the regular NYT readers - ed] is one of the world’s most abundant classes of military small-arms cartridges, and can come from dozens of potential suppliers.

So you found one of the world's most abundant cartridges in 17 AK magazines in Afghanistan, and that is worthy of this hysterical story? You guys must be desperate. I swear, it's like the guy was given a "Cartridges of the World" book by some Marine, and he read it on the john one day and got this wild-assed idea that he had now unlocked the secret codes on the headstamps of cartridge casings. I mean, what do you think:

The examination of the Taliban’s cartridges found telling signs of diversion: 17 of the magazines contained ammunition bearing either of two stamps: the word “WOLF” in uppercase letters, or the lowercase arrangement “bxn.”

Telling, you say? I must read more:

“WOLF” stamps mark ammunition from Wolf Performance Ammunition, a company in California that sells Russian-made cartridges to American gun owners. The company has also provided cartridges for Afghan soldiers and police officers, typically through middlemen. Its munitions can be found in Afghan government bunkers.

And US gun shows. Though it's not said, I get the feeling that this underwhelming bit of literature is stretching toward blaming the US for dozens of 7.62 Russian cartridges being found in Afghanistan. It's just gotta be our fault.

No wonder the NYT is struggling.

No similarly thorough accountability system exists for ammunition, which is harder to trace and more liquid than firearms, readily changing hands through corruption, illegal sales, theft, battlefield loss and other forms of diversion.

Meaning that the dozens of terrifying rounds could have come from anywhere, and that perhaps we should encourage the Afghan government to implement a comprehensive microstamping law. That will surely stop the clever Taliban from acquiring handfuls of ammunition in the future!

But military officials, arms analysts and dealers say it points to a worrisome possibility: With only spotty American and Afghan controls on the vast inventory of weapons and ammunition sent into Afghanistan during an eight-year conflict, poor discipline and outright corruption among Afghan forces may have helped insurgents stay supplied.

Finding a teeny tiny sampling of what is probably the most prolific rifle cartridge ever made is "worrisome," and is keeping highly trained reporters not only gainfully employed, but awake at night as well.

Oh, but there's more folks:

In the American ambush last month, all of the 10 captured rifles had factory stamps from China or Izhevsk, Russia. Those with date stamps had been manufactured in the 1960s and ’70s.

I'll be damned. You mean Mao Zedong and Leonid Brezhnev are behind this? I have been wondering for years how Russian AKs made their way into the country in the first place. This explains everything.

This is what passes for modern US journalism these days. To think major newspapers are just baffled as to why they're folding left and right. "Why isn't anyone reading our paper!?!?"

Good grief. I've already wasted enough of your time on this trash. Enjoy the rest of your day.

While I'm sure that most of them behaved themselves, there seems to be no shortage of drunken idiots:

"One concerned spectator asked them if it was against police regulations to be drinking alcohol while carrying weapons. In response, one of the officers teetered over, spilled his beer, put his finger to his lips and slurred, "shhhhh" - giggling uncontrollably."

And that's just one account.

Why are they not held to the same standards as the rest of us?

Last week my sister went to New York City with some friends, and while they were there they went to a club. Nothing unusual there except that my wife showed me an after action picture from that night where some off duty NYC cop posed next to my sister and her friends with his loaded, issued Glock 26 pointed at her head. At the club. Where everyone was drinking.

My sister didn't notice it from the picture, but my brother did. She doesn't think it was a big deal, and the cop did it out of negligence, not on purpose, but the point still stands that citizens are not allowed to carry firearms in NYC because state politicians think we're too stupid to handle weapons safely, but cops are exempted from the laws. The picture, which my sister does not want me to post, shows that cops are not infallible, and are just as capable of making a mistake as the rest of us.

What really bothers me is that if I had pulled out my Glock while drinking in a bar and pointed it at a citizens head, no matter if it was accidental, or if I drunkenly unloaded my firearm at a bell tower in DC, my ass would be in jail awaiting a sentence.

Sometimes I hate that I abide by the law, and last Thursday was no exception. I've been to the Convention Center enough times to know that it's dangerous, but I had to go there again and I left my protection home anyways.

What a terrible choice to have to face: being unarmed in a dangerous place in order to stay in line with the law, or breaking the law to have a chance should some gang of scumbags try to take your life.

The last citizen says it best:

"Our society is dissipating."

I would have to agree, but I don't see much of a difference between the armed gangs who are murdering people or the politicians and bureaucrats who disarm the victims and make it all possible.

Joshua Brandon Norris faced one count of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and a second count for possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony. But in a court hearing in January, he was presented with what the judge described as "the break of your life."

He pleaded no contest to the first count; the second charge was dropped. He got six years of probation, a $1,000 fine and 240 hours of community service. He avoided any jail time, and the plea also mandated that he "remain in college and complete your college degree," according to court transcripts. The sentence was not the judge's idea, but he followed the prosecutor's recommendation.

What do judges get paid to do these days?

As long as scumbags like Norris keep getting free passes from the consequences of a violent crime, society will continue to get preyed upon.

Friday, May 15, 2009

First off is that I find it especially appropriate that these teenage Boy Scouts are practicing the killing of "a disgruntled Iraq war veteran" in a town named "Imperial."

It is not at all politically incorrect to teach our youth to use automatic weapons to engage ". . .illegal border crossers . . . . facing down terrorists and taking out “active shooters,” like those who bring gunfire and death to college campuses" . . .or, you know, US veterans who have, like, actually charged into a real firefight and killed real terrorists.

Lets practice killing the men and women who have kept America safe. Brilliant.

Next up, teaching our youth how to be brutal to potheads:

“Put him on his face and put a knee in his back,” a Border Patrol agent explained. “I guarantee that he’ll shut up.”

Awesome! What could possibly go wrong?

One participant, Felix Arce, 16, said he liked “the discipline of the program,” which was something he said his life was lacking. “I want to be a lawyer, and this teaches you about how crimes are committed,” he said.

The Explorer posts are attached to various agencies, including the Federal Bureau of Investigation and local police and fire departments, that sponsor them much the way churches sponsor Boy Scout troops.

Churches don't sponsor this type of behaviour from Boy Scouts - indeed, I can remember plenty of times the Boy Scouts have caught flak for teaching archery and shooting clay pigeons - and I don't see how teaching kids to raid a bus or pot field has anything to do with the fire department. To join the FBI as an agent, one must have a 4 year degree, so practicing paramilitary tactics on people in the US ten years before they would even be eligible to join the agency is pretty stupid.

I'm all for teaching kids ho to shoot; teaching them how to survive; teaching them to defend themselves; letting them play paintball; whatever. But simulating an aggressive coordinated killing of people at that age is disgusting.

What's next? SERE school? Why don't we just send them to Iran so they can really learn how to extract information from somebody.

"She's a bad choice," George Smith, a protein chemist and senior fellow at GlobalSecurity.org., told FOXNews.com. "Her predictions on biotoerrorism don't seem to be based on any reality I share."

"This is an administration that claims that it is looking for rational fact-based policies," said Milton Leitenberg, a senior research scholar at the University of Maryland. "If so, this person is a catastrophic appointment."

Awesome!

That's not really the type of field where you want to have your peers telling the press that you're a "catastrophic appointment." That won't make Americans sleep well at night.

But Richard Ebright, a microbiologist and homeland security policy critic at Rutgers University, told FOXNews.com that O'Toole helped put a response in place after the 2001 anthrax attack that "has dramatically increased the risk of further attack of the same nature" -- because more people are working with biological agents in U.S. laboratories.

He noted that since 2001, more than 400 institutions and 15,000 individuals have been authorized to handle deadly agents, calling the response "irrational" and "counterproductive."

I would have to agree. When you allow more people to access to biological or chemical weapons, then you will inevitably lose some control of them. Losing any degree of control with weapons grade agent is stupid, and is bound to result in something. . . catastrophic.

What really troubles me is that one of O'Toole's supporters unknowingly agrees with me:

"There's so much information he [Ebright] doesn't have access to," Larsen told FOXNews.com, arguing that the threat of bioterrorism is real, even if Al Qaeda terrorists lack the sophistication to produce those weapons. "We're not worried about some guy in a cave making a biological agent. We're worried about a biologist becoming a terrorist."

So he's defending O'Toole's plan that drastically expanded the number of people who handle biological weapons, and then says that he's worried about a biologist using the bio agent for nefarious purposes. What could go wrong?

The solution to this conundrum is to. . . . . . .hire more scientists, give them access to weapons grade Anthrax, and task them to find out what to do in case a rogue scientist who has been given access to weapons grade Anthrax decides to go postal!!

"It's like we're sending our babies out to war every day and I guess my baby was trying to be a soldier but he did it in the wrong way," said the suspect's mother, Kisha Wright.

This is a naked look into the root of the problem of teenagers wanting to kill other teenagers. It's not that guns are easy to get, or that they don't have enough supervision, or that there is not enough laws or security to prevent these kinds of things - he was screened by metal detectors and had his bag taken away beforehand - but a deeper problem that starts with our youth being fed the idea that they are not responsible for what goes on in their lives.

And the blame for that problem can ultimately be placed squarely on the shoulders of the parents.

Wright claims her son was bullied at other schools and felt intimidated at S.O.A.R. -- where every student has a record of trouble.

"I think he just wanted to make the situation stop so he can get away and be left alone," said Wright. "He's not a bad child, he's just kind of lost."

It's not his fault!! He's a good kid!! He's the victim!!! Hell, they're all victims!!!!

Actually, he's not a kid. One does not magically become an adult mentally on their 18th birthday; this guy knew exactly what he was doing.

When the parent sends their son or daughter out into the world every day with the notion that others are to blame for their problems; that they are a victim; and that they are "soldiers" in a "war," then this is the exact kind of product that they can expect.

"Daddy walked out on us," "The Man is keeping you down," "it's the evil rich people making life hard;" these are all just excuses.

And I blamed the kids until I heard the mother talk. And then I heard the father talk. . . . - Bill Cosby

Parents enable this behaviour by raising militant victims.

Life is rarely fair, there will always be people who will take advantage of others, and as my father would often tell me: "you're not the only pebble on the beach!" What he was telling me was that many of the folks before me or around me have made more of themselves, with much less, and through more difficult times than I could possible imagine, and that I should quit complaining and press on.

I had little to argue with him; he was the perfect example.

I can remember, many years ago, when my father took a fall off the roof of a church that he was working on and broke his back, his knee, and both of his ankles. He was supposed to be bed ridden for half a year, but since no one was braying on our door offering to pay our bills, he had to cut that time short. I can vividly remember him wincing in unimaginable pain as he got to his feet at 0530 one morning, not six weeks after the accident, and duct taping a National Geographic magazine to his back and chest in order to keep himself upright while he went out to find work.

Life was not smiling down on him that day, but he pressed on without ever noticing the profound impact that that act made on his young son that morning. When things in my life start to suck, the image of him getting back up immediately pops back into my mind, and I know that life ain't always fair.

I hope that I make such an example to my children, just not that painful. And you can bet that I'm not going to teach them to be perpetual victims in a apathetic society that rewards stupid parents who raise stupid kids, and blame life's bumps and bruises on everyone else.

I'll teach them to quit complaining and press on. I can only hope that other parents do the same.

Tuesday, May 12, 2009

In its own defense, the county presented gunfire noise levels taken Friday by sheriff's deputies. Sheriff's Lt. Ron Hundley said deputies at the industrial building shot a 9mm pistol and a .233-caliber rifle, guns typically used in O'Gara training. Other deputies recorded noise levels at five locations ranging from a quarter-mile to about 2 miles away.

Now, take your puny 6.8 SPC and 6.5 Grendel and get the hell out!!

.233 RULEZ!!!!1!!

On the other hand, the quickest way to piss off the citizenry is to keep them in the dark about what goes on in their AO; especially shooty stuff.

Imagine waking up to automatic gunfire, artillery simulators, and tire squealing without any knowledge of what is going on?

Baghdad (AP) - A U.S. soldier opened fire at a counseling center on a U.S. base Monday, killing five fellow soldiers before being taken into custody, the U.S. command and Pentagon officials said.

The shooting occurred at Camp Liberty, a sprawling U.S. base on the western edge of Baghdad near the city's international airport and adjacent to another facility where President Barack Obama visited last month.

Monday, May 11, 2009

I started this weekend and fully intended to have a post up last night, but I picked a long movie this time that I haven't finished yet. Judging by the status bar, I though I was getting near the end, but then realised I was screwed when I had to flip the DVD over.

"This passage was a metaphor meant to describe how American troops felt about our 43rd president," Feherty said in a statement. "In retrospect, it was inappropriate and unacceptable, and has clearly insulted Speaker Pelosi and Senator Reid, . . ."

Both of which have clearly insulted the troops more times than I care to count.

Gordon says deputies were responding to reports that someone was riding a bicycle and brandishing a handgun. They spotted the rider and ordered him to drop the weapon but instead, Gordon says he pointed it at the deputies.

This sort of thing was unheard of in my youth. Toy guns back then were far more realistic looking than anything on the shelves now, and pointing one at a cop would have only provoked a warning shot from his finger.

I do believe that this is a product of communities forming the notoriously effective "neighborhood watch" which calls for good intentioned folks to phone the police to report anything suspicious, instead of taking some personal responsibility and checking things out themselves.

I've heard that neighborhood watches scare thieves and gang bangers to their very soul. *snicker*

You can't be too safe these days. Besides, determining whether a kid is playing with a toy gun or a real gun is best left to the authorities. They're trained to make such life-and-death decisions.

On that note, what does it say about society in California when the adults are so used to kids shooting each other with real guns that they call the cops on a kid with a toy gun, and the cop responds by shooting him? I see that as backwards progress, personally.

Maybe California just needs some tough laws to make everyone safe. *snicker*

Friday, May 8, 2009

Sure there were many glaring errors, and Stahl interviewed several anti-gunners and only one pro gun source, VCDL President Philip Van Cleave, but she did give him a decent amount of air time, and didn't manipulate his words. Such journalistic honesty is hard to find these days, and I point this out in hopes that her example will someday be followed.

And remember, that's a third of the relatively insignificant quantity of guns reported, vs. actually warehoused, and that assumes what is in official inventory reflects 100% of what has been seized. Any bets that it's even close?

Which is probably a good thing, because if it takes 100 newly-assigned "Project Gunrunner" ATF agents "(and those are in addition to the organization already in place!) to help unclog the 700-weapon backlog," imagine what a boondoggle it would be if you dropped 300,000+ serial numbers into their trough. Especially since, based on "time to crime," it looks like most of them are 14 years old!

No statement yet from Mexican President Felipe Calderon on what his country plans on doing about the violent drug cartels that are sending violent killers armed with automatic weapons and grenades into the US from Mexico. Perhaps his country should ban them. That seems to work out well.

Jim Spellman, who has no doubt done exhaustive research into his piece on brisk ammunition sales in the US, seems to have missed something. I know investigating is hard and all, be we have Google these days, so finding some answers shouldn't be hard.

Let's take a look:

While campaigning for the White House, Obama supported re-enacting the now-expired ban on assault weapons. But there is no indication that the administration will take up that measure -- or any other gun-control initiative --anytime soon.

This list of attempts is not comprehensive, and I found all of this after a rigorous consult with Google-the-wise over breakfast. So my question is: what do they pay reporters to do these days? Lou Dobbs aside, they sure don't investigate anything.

Update: DoD ended the sale of fired brass to the commercial market, but it was reversed soon afterwords. I was merely pointing out the attempt.

David Codrea's Gun Rights Examiner yesterday discusses the media blackout of a case that should at least get a looksee from big box news, and he discusses the case on his blog The War on Guns here, here, and here.

Go check it out.

If that doesn't get your blood boiling this morning than I don't know what will.

Monday, May 4, 2009

You do realize that FOX is the one with American Idol and 24, and FOX News is the one with Sean Hannity and Bill O'Reilly, right? And that they are not the same channel? No, you obviously don't, because you are dumber than an acre of fungus.

Thomas allegedly preyed on elderly women who were living alone, according to police, beating and raping his victims before strangling them to death. Unbeknown to his co-workers, Thomas, 72, had an extensive criminal history.

He was tied to the latest charges through DNA samples taken from him in October 2008, as part of California's ongoing process to swab registered sex offenders. Thomas was required to give the sample because of a rape conviction in 1978 in Pasadena. He was also convicted of burglary and attempted rape in Los Angeles in 1957. On March 27, the California Department of Justice DNA Laboratory notified detectives that his DNA matched evidence form the rape and murder of Ethel Sokoloff, 68, in the mid-Wilshire area in 1972. On March 31, they were told that his DNA matched four other slayings.

Emphasis mine.

California cherishes it's "A+" rating from the Brady Campaign for it's tough gun laws that obviously didn't do Thomas' victims any good. How it was decided to release this guy over and over again into the public is anybody's guess.

I just don't see the logic in trying to prevent predators from killing by disarming the prey, and then when you catch the predator you keep letting him go.

"Arming merchant sailors may result in the acquisition of ever more lethal weapons and tactics by the pirates, a race that merchant sailors cannot win," the Maersk Inc. chairman said in his prepared remarks.

They use AK-47s and RPGs right now; just what "more lethal" weapons does Clancey think that pirates will use? An RPK? Not a whole lot of difference in the scope of things. And how he thinks that the crew of a huge ship would be unable to arm with Superior weapons against pirates on a wimpy little motor boat is laughable. None the less, pirates with "more lethal" weapons were recently driven off by crew members with pistols. Twice.

Maersk Alabama Capt. Richard Phillips says that the crews should be armed:

"It would be my personal preference that a limited number of crew aboard the vessel have access to effective weaponry," Phillips told the panel, his wife and a crew member seated behind him.

And the notion of crew members, armed and out to sea for weeks or months, could be a recipe for deadly and costly accidents.

"There have been incidents where innocent bystanders have been killed," Clancey said. "There is exposure."

Innocent bystanders? Where? You have a crew of about a dozen guys on a big ass ship that's out to sea, or at anchor, and he's worried about bystanders? These guys could shoot howitzers while at sea and not hurt anybody. While at port they could put everything in an arms room under the control of a Master-at-Arms, and would be good to go.

As it stands, that still doesn't address the problem of insurance companies not covering ships with armed crews. Ultimately, that policy is pushed by fear of litigation, which is why I say that lawyers are gonna be the end of this world, not to mention sue happy people that pay them.

HARTFORD, Conn. -- The Connecticut Senate on Thursday approved a measure that would ban children under 16 years old from handling or shooting machine guns.

Because of one freak accident, Connecticut politicians pull out the 'ban' card to save everybody from themselves, and thus rob thousands of American youths with responsible parents the chance to fire an automatic weapon.

Besides the one incident resulting from negligent supervision, I've never heard of anyone getting shot at a machine gun shoot. Negligent parents crashing their SUV's into stuff resulting in the death of their family because they were distracted by their cell phone or McTasty is a day to day occurrence though.

Automobile? Sure, they're useful, everyone should be able to drive one even with minimal training, even illegal aliens. No big deal.

Firearm? No one should have one of those because they're too dangerous, and you need lightning fast reflexes and extensive training to handle one. Only police officers are qualified.

As I've said before, people say that firearms are too dangerous for citizens to handle, but think nothing of hurling down the road in a 5,600 lb. Tahoe while talking on a cell phone with the only thing separating them from crashing into another mindless motorist being a 6" wide stripe of yellow paint.

The only reason this bill got passed is because the visceral reaction to the death of an eight year old by firearm is driven by emotion, while we are callused to the death of children in house fires or automobile crashes.